An Armour anti Crime

 Yes, I do not mind owning it up. Well, yes, I do like to read detective stories. I adore Sherlock Holmes. On the one hand, it is an intelligent literary construction. Actually, the plot is so structured that if you are a brilliant observer, there is an Ariadne's thread, right at the beginning, unmistakable, glaring at you, and yet most often missed. The detective stories are an intellectual joy. Seeking the hidden is a superb skill and the detective stories, be it Conan Doyle, Agatha Christie, and many such other literary giants, they provide a great conceptual adrenaline bottled in a smart presentation. 

Now a days, however, such stories and their dramatizations serve another purpose. We live in quite horrid times wherein foul is  vicious, sinful, horrid, and yet lacking subtlety. In great literature, there is superb depiction of villains and vamps, Iago, Gilbert Osmond, Madame Merle, to mention a few.

Unfortunately, however, the criminality now is complex in a dirty way, and yet quite in the face. Take any field, and this truth holds a mirror to our times. Hence watching such dramatisations is actually protecting oneself. These are not psychologically subtle,yet they have a behavioural truth. Knowing it is indeed an alternative source of energy!

Pratima@ Given the current culture of dishonesty, better to wear such an armour!

Peacenik!

 That video said a lot. The hurriedly called, secret meeting of the Ukraine politicos was on. Off the dais, but in focus was the president of Ukraine, Mr. Zelensky, getting himself a chair!

He is in the age group of world leaders like Mr. Justin Trudeau of Canada, Mr. Emannuel Macron of France, Ms. Jacinda Ardern of New Zealand. Unlike them, however, he comes to politics from the show business. Apparently, he was a stand-up comic.

Hence he would know the relevance of the 'bottom up' approach to the status quo, right? No wonder, he is so very comfortable in his skin. He can drag a chair for himself. Without standing on any ceremony, he can directly be with his soldiers on the war ravaged streets. He has the gumption to tell the Nato how the organization has betrayed Ukraine, with the mighty Russia in its backyard precisely because of the Nato issue.

Hope that such wisdom makes him a peacenik. It is very sad to have to read Kiev, Odessa, places one liked because one loves Russian literature and Eisenstein films, getting bombarded, destroyed, raized to dust heaps. Much worse is the imminent threat of the atomic war as an almost certain possibility. 

Hope Mr. Zelensky sees the ugliness of the black humour of the Ukrainian condition. Ditched by Nato (and, of course, the Big Bro, the U.S.) and attacked by the Elder Bro, Russia, Ukraine needs a peaceful, happy ending soon. Hope the erstwhile comic realises  that all that ends soon may end less tragically!

Pratima @As an act, war brings neither a laugh at the lips, nor a smile in the heart!

Astrology?!?

 Is there any astrological influence indeed? Why is it then that nobody (as I have not read Nostradamus, I would not know about his 'revered' predictions) could foretell either the Corona caused pandemic or the Ukraine crisis?

Poor distant planets and stars! They rotate as per their given routes. Why blame them when actually people around are much much worse than all the saturn's, and all the other evil planets put together? 

Are marriages ever decided as per the planetary confluence? That is just a fig leaf. Most marriages are nothing  but a heinous trade(-off). Some parties sell themselves for an easy life, and, also, may be, because without the monies, their ambitions would not be 'affected', while the other half buy respectability, I suppose. 

Horribly garish - I saw two such eyesores recently- are the photos of such weddings. Sheer tinsel stuff it is. Absolutely in bad taste is the vulgar show-off of monies. When a camera zooms in on a jewellery box/item, not to miss the avid, greedy and gloating expression on the face of the person in question, especially the receiver, and the rudely proud, arrogantly smirky expression on the face  of the giver, one pities all the so-called 'rasm', the anyway empty rituals rendered further meaningless thus, which absolutely lose all their purity, sheen, beauty.

Do people influence each other or the poor distant planets and stars? If one is in the constant company of a crude person, would not that make a person crass, rather than some poor planet? 

Once I saw two lovely videos of how rhythmic, beautiful patterns are designed by the rotations of the planets. So vibrant were the patterns that I actually was ready to accept the medieval notion of the music universalis or the music of spheres.  Why blame such wonders for human vices and frailties? The huge telescopes are further exploring the wonders of more and more milky ways. Why blame these distant beauties for blemishes in human behaviour, right? Indeed, why 'make the sun, the moon, and stars guilty' of human prevarication?

Pratima @ "the fault is not in our stars, but in us".

Marvelous Melody

 This evening I had a great time. To begin with, I was listening to a superb song, the great ghazal, "main kya janu?" It is one of my all time favourites. This 1940 song  is written by Kedar Sharma. There is nothing simply unusual in the poetic composition actually. It is mostly made of monosyllabic, rather folksy, quite simple Hindi like vocabulary, unlike the other heavily urdu-ised diction of "ghazals".

The music composition is by Pankaj Mullick who has built it along the Yaman notations. What makes this paean to the beloved's eyes truly melodious is its rendition.

This evening I heard it sung in three scintillating voices, the original Saigal version, the Lata adoption and the Rahul adaptation. All the three are indeed unique and special.

Saigal's is a superb presentation which explains why he is the singers' singer. I love it despite the old fashioned pronunciation for the unmistakable passion pored out in that lilting voice of his. when Lataji sings it, it must have been her heydays, her soft yet crystal clear and sharp melodious voice makes the song in to manna for the ears.  Rahul Deshpande's version is an exploration, novel though raag-based. 

Each version is unparalleled. If Saigal's flows like a string of illustrious, precious pearls, Lata's is like a unique diamond, brilliant and priceless, simply one of a kind. Rahul Deshpande's classical rendition is sheer gold. 

As a listener, it is my sheer luck that I get to hear these unique renditions, not to mention many more by Lucky Ali, for instance. Music is indeed a very rich and soul satisfying accomplishment, a symbiosis that enriches the lyricist, the composer, the singer, and the audience. No wonder, now it is a great therapy, too.  Long live listening to such marvelous melodies!

Pratima@Aai-Papa loved it, too.

Affinity

 Affinity with animals, togetherness with the flora and the fauna, that is what makes the real world. Have we forgotten that empathy? Luckily, may be, some ten to twenty per cent people care for their pets and their terrace gardens. Most, however, have forgotten the "il faut cultiver notre jardin", the Candide message of Voltaire with its quasi-Edenic echoes.

We need to revive that feel for our own survival. If animal species become extinct, if certain plants/trees die, we, too, would not survive. In the current consumerist lust for using every inch of any scenic beauty, many sea shores have lost the mangroves, for example. The rising sea water hence would drown metros like Mumbai. When hunters kill a lion or a tiger for fun or for some imagined medicinal value of their body parts, they are actually killing an entire life chain!

Last year I used to teach a great 1854 text entitled " A Simple Philosophy ". It was a letter written by Seathl, the Chief of the Native American Suquamish tribe of the state of Washington. Addressed to the White President of the USA, it talked of the beasts of the land as brothers and the earth as the mother. It ended with " this earth is precious to God, who is the God of All, and even the white man cannot escape this common destiny."

Much water has flown under the bridge thence. Be it colonisation or consumerist consumption, the historical march of political economy is an eternal fast forward to mindless destruction. Unfortunately, it is self destruction, too, which we choose to overlook in our colonising of the skyscape via the sky'scrap'ers or of the very galactic space now as plots on the Moon and the Mars are already on sale.

If at all we put up a "show off" for caring the fauna and the flora, easy photo-op's are sexy. So we choose to save the tiger, but who would bother for the city vanquished bats or sparrows? They are hardly that attractive, right? When we ignore such details, we invite  nature's wrath, be it the changed seasonal cycle or wild fires (when they are 'not' planted, of course).

Well, we are not eroding the soil, for example. We are erasing our own future generations to extinction. Hope we wake up, listen to the fervent cry of the wild life on this day dedicated to its conservation, and beyond.

Pratima@ save other species to save the human species!

Sadism

 There is apparently this quote by Ovid which maintains that no pleasure is great unless it involves someone else's pain. Perfect definition of sadism it is. Sadistic people cannot be happy unless and until someone else is harassed, bothered, ill-treated, and, mind you, this ill treatment is absolutely conscious.

How to counter it? One should never ever be masochistic. Masochism is taking pleasure in one's harassment. It is the other side of the sadism coin. There is this psychological typology that talks of people who are silently aggressive. In other words, their behaviour is apparently meek, but just underneath the veneer, they are passive-aggressive, the worst form of the sadistic taxonomy.

How to counter sadism?  I feel the best response is to be found in "1984" by George Orwell.  O'Brien, that subtlest of the villains, almost Iago-like, defines sadism indirectly. It is the best image of power. It is an eternal boot trying to crush a face, a human face underneath. 

Therein lies the panacea to counter sadism in my opinion.When one can see, can feel that boot approaching your face  to  squash it, to squish it to pulp, remove yourself , your face from there. Even if you manage to budge an inch, the knee, the boot bearing the foot would hurt itself badly, and would ten times think before harassing you.

Indeed, it is no use being a martyr to a crook. A Hitler would not understand or listen to a Gandhi. No use offering poems and/or flowers to a barrel of a gun. It would the best to just remove yourself away from others' power politics victimising you!

Pratima@It is indeed important to be just and nice to one's own self, too!

Not merely 'not', but 'anti'

 It is the Mahashivaratra today. The fast is a celebration of  'Shiva', the pure, the elemental, the core of/in the universe. Shiva, the 'pater familias' of Lord Gajanana  and Lord Kartikeya, and the peerless consort of Pavati, who 'chose' to be his, despite stiff opposition, is all that is superb and grand every which way. No wonder, the great, grand Himalayas are Lord Shiva's abode. Everything about Lord Shiva is unique, pure, holy.

If we were to look at the Shiva principle a little differently, we would realise that His basic thematic, His narrative, if you want it in that fashion, is hugely inclusive. He is the God of the gods. Yet even ghosts, devils, demons could worship him. Look at his flock of  the  countless 'gana's' . That would clarify my point. The human, the non-human, the sub-human, all He acknowledges, accepts as his devotees. Often, in the mythology, his wedding procession is presented as terrifying, as it is absolutely inclusive. Well, this is not the scholarly platform to discuss how/when the Shiva principle emerged, how it got authenticated in the pantheon, and in history, for instance, though.

This notion of inclusion is the day's theme,too, according to the U.N. It is a day dedicated to a critique that questions discrimination on any basis, be it class, gender, age (ace-ing currently), caste (post-Mandal in a BIG way in India), region, religion, language, profession, preferences of any type, food, for example, the list can continue as nauseam.

The real need of the day is not merely being non-. One must now be anti-. Let me now give the example that I had so far saved to establish my choice of the right prefix. Look at the concept of race. Now is the time to assert an active agency. 

Now is the time to be proactive. So you can not be merely non-racist, you are anti-racist. Similarly, you are anti-war, too, given the current context. An active and assertive stance that brooks no nonsense is the position demanded of each and everyone now. That is the way we would be truly inclusive in preaching and praxis, like the Shiva principle.

Pratima@ Inclusion is far better than identity politics